Public Employee Press

ON THE JOB FOR NYC
Local 1455 members bring in the bucks

By DIANE S. WILLIAMS

Each year the members of New York City Traffic Employees Local 1455 haul in $100 million in revenue — mostly in quarters — from parking meters and muni-meters in the five boroughs.

New muni-meters are an essential part of the plan Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced last month to turn the Times Square theater district into a traffic-free zone for pedestrians and theatergoers, a park space where there was none. And the union Traffic Device Maintainers, City Parking Meter Service Workers and their Supervisors will do the transformation.

The mayor said the new “Broadway Boulevard” will be in place by August 2009. “TDMs will install between 20 and 50 muni-meters and post dozens of parking signs in the theater district to ease traffic flow and create more public parking and park space for New Yorkers and tourists to enjoy,” said Local 1455 President Mike DeMarco.

Times Square transformation

About 30 Local 1455 members will install new muni-meters on side streets from 42nd Street to 34th Street between Broadway and Sixth and Seventh avenues, creating commercial parking during the day and motorist parking in the evening.

The plan is to fill Times Square with benches, tables and flower boxes — and people — add lanes for bicyclists and reduce vehicular traffic to two lanes from four.

The Dept. of Transportation plan would ease traffic flow in the famously congested “crossroads of the world.” DOT hopes the side street parking will free up Times Square for millions of gawking tourists to admire Broadway’s dazzling lights and sights.

City Parking Meter Service Workers collect the coins from parking meters and muni-meters and TDMs maintain the city-owned parking lots by removing snow and debris — from pigeon droppings to drug vials, garbage and dead animals — to keep city streets and public parking facilities safe and clean. To ensure public safety, they paint parking lines, mark pedestrian, bicycle and traffic lanes, install and repair fencing, fill potholes, and repair sidewalks.

Additionally, Local 1455 members participate in a traffic sign contracting-in program. Members are rewarded for producing and installing traffic signs in-house above the department’s goal of 10.5 signs per day. The more signs employees install, the more they can earn.

“The program started because work was going to be contracted out. Since the 1990s, when the program began, we have saved the city millions of dollars,” DeMarco explained. Last year 41 TDMs in the five boroughs shared a bonus for installing and replacing 111,716 signs. The in-house contract is renewed every two years and produces signs more affordably than outside vendors. The Broadway project will be a boon to sign production. “We proved we can do the work cheaper in-house,” said DeMarco. “It’s a win-win for our members and the city.”